Committed Suicide in a Total Schizophrenic Cohort: In Search of the Suicidal Process

In an epidemiologic case-finding study of 341 persons diagnosed as having “long-term functional psychosis”, 7 persons with schizophrenia had committed suicide during a follow-up period of 3 years. Data about the seven cases were retrospectively gathered through studies of medical case records and through interviews with significant others and care personnel/psychotherapists. All seven persons had been chronically ill. Most of them were in a state of remission from their illness before the suicide and even showed signs of lasting improvement. The individuals had premorbidly been functioning rather well, with normal ambitions. Late in their illness they expressed a sense of loss of a former self and feelings of being hopelessly handicapped and separated from what they considered to be normal life. All seven persons had also experienced negative life events shortly before the suicide. The time perspective of having lived with a chronic mental illness for many years seems to have been of major importance in the development of most of the individual suicidal processes.